The circular economy of cinemas

Convenience has completely changed the way we prepare, conserve, and consume food. Analogous to the insatiable appetite for recalling digital information 24/7, coffee-to-go is part of the modern lifestyle, and along with it come coffee cups. The consumer wants to be able to drink coffee anywhere and trash the cup immediately afterwards. It’s the everyday culture of convenience – coffee on the way to work, on the set, in the soccer stadium, and in the cinema too. Millions of coffee-to-go cups end up as waste in parks and nature settings. Either charging a “Latte Levy” or giving a discount to consumers who bring their own coffee cups can stem the flood of disposable cups.

In German soccer stadiums, where ten million single-use cups were wasted each year, the reusable plastic cup has proved to be successful. The cups carry a returnable deposit and are cleaned after each usage. This is how FC Bayern Munich is saving 1.4 million single-use cups in the Allianz Arena every year. The production of a paper cup generates an average carbon emission of 110 grams. Reusable cups become more environmentally friendly after five utilizations, and they are typically used more than forty times. Several German Bundesliga clubs installed collection points outside the stadium where the cups can be returned in exchange for the deposit or put in a collection box for deposit donations.

Reusable cup systems are also a matter for cinemas to consider. “We have to take responsibility if there are alternatives to the single-use system”, says Andreas Hufer, Managing Director F&B at the Kinopolis group, which operates seventeen cinema centers with 142 screens in Germany. Kinopolis is beta-testing a system for reusable cups in their Dolby Cinema, a state-of-the-art screen with laser projection as well as a powerful new sound system in the Mathäser Multiplex in Munich.

For the multiple-usage system, an IML (in-mold labeling) cup was selected from a concession supplier. An IML cup can withstand up to one hundred rinse cycles. Further rinse cycles deform the IML cup and render it useless. The dishwasher also plays an important role. “In a traditional gastronomic dishwasher, drying is performed by heating, but a plastic cup doesn’t absorb heat well”, Hufer explains. “The water stays on the edges of the IML cups.”

A better solution for drying plastic cups is a dishwasher with heat recovery or a mobile dishwasher that has been specially designed for large events. The multiplex cinema in Munich has two built-in dishwashers that can dry cups in fifteen minutes. In the end, the reusable cup system in a multiplex cinema stands or falls by the number of cups returned by film-goers. Since as many as a thousand film-goers can be exiting a screening room at the same time, the concession-stand personnel are then overwhelmed and unable to handle so many deposit return requests at once. Nor is an automat a profitable solution.

“The sustainable reusable cup concept only pays off if the cups remain closed-cycle”, Hufer points out. “Because a reusable cup costs ten times more than a single-use cup.” At the Dolby Cinema, clips are screened to appeal to cinema-goers to return their cups after using them and not to trash them. If the film-goers participate in sufficient numbers, then the Kinopolis group will extend the program to its other multiplex cinemas.

Fotos: © Andreas Hufer/Kinopolis Multiplex Management GmbH